


5th Gear

by lowflyingidiom



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Farm/Ranch, Barret is a sexy cowboy, Fluff, M/M, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-01-15
Packaged: 2021-03-12 21:02:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28766769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lowflyingidiom/pseuds/lowflyingidiom
Summary: Of all the damn things Rufus could have chosen for the year’s corporate retreat, he chose a dude ranch.Reeve was already planning his excuse as he drove out of the city - sick parent? No, too verifiable. Sick cat? No, he’d had to spend weeks fielding questions about the cat’s well being after the last time. Cat sitter bailed? Yes, perfect. Half the office had seen the cat pictures on his desk. No one would expect him to leave the pampered, fussy, capricious Cait Sith by himself - or worse, with astrangerfor an entire week.He’d go, shake hands with everyone, hang around a couple of hours pretending to have a good time... and then receive an urgent text that he needed to get back to Midgar. It would be fine.The dude ranch AU that nobody asked for.
Relationships: Reeve Tuesti/Barret Wallace
Comments: 6
Kudos: 12





	5th Gear

**Author's Note:**

> I have absolutely no defense for this except to say that [Mabs started it](https://twitter.com/mabs_art/status/1348630148724129794) \- hurray for Year of the Ox :) 
> 
> I am so sorry to everyone waiting for updates on my other fics.

Of all the damn ridiculous things Rufus could have chosen for the year’s corporate retreat, he chose a dude ranch. 

Reeve was already planning his excuse as he drove out of the city - sick parent? No, too verifiable. Sick cat? No, he’d had to spend weeks fielding questions about the cat’s well being after the last time. Cat sitter bailed? Yes, perfect. Half the office had seen the cat pictures on his desk. No one would expect him to leave the pampered, fussy, capricious Cait Sith by himself - or worse, with a _stranger_ for an entire week.

Rufus wanted him to give some talk no one would pay attention to about relations with municipal governments, but it was nothing he couldn’t teleconference from his living room. He’d go, shake hands with everyone, hang around a couple of hours pretending to have a good time... and then receive an urgent text that he needed to get back to Midgar. It was flawless. 

Armed with a solid way out, he cranked the radio and shifted into fifth gear.

\---

His enthusiasm for the retreat did not improve once his GPS had taken him off the paved roads, gravel pinging against his pristine paint job and dust coating the windshield. Probably the rest of the car too. 

His mood did not improve when the computer generated voice let him know that his destination was coming up on the left, the first driveway for kilometers leading into a copse of trees behind a sign announcing _Avalanche Ranch Rescue_. 

Everything about it was so... rural. Reeve wasn’t sure what cows smelled like, precisely, but he was pretty sure that he was finding out as he guided his car along a rutted track of a driveway that it was never designed to navigate, eventually leveling out into a wide parking lot in view of an old ranch house and a series of barns beyond that.

Most of his coworkers appeared to have arrived ahead of him - people he recognized from the office, people from other regional branches he would never see again and who would surely forget him as quickly as he forgot them. The whole mass was milling around the lot near a young woman who appeared to be handing out orientation pamphlets. 

It was perfect - with everyone already arrived he could say his hellos (and goodbyes) and head back for the city in half the time. He started by making his way to where Elena, a bubbly blond woman from recruiting with whom he’d become close enough to occasionally grab a beer after work, was standing with a few other people from her department. 

“Reeve!” she looked genuinely excited to see him, and he _almost_ felt guilty for how quickly he was planning to get the hell out of Dodge. 

“Good to see you Elena,” he nodded and shook hands around the circle she was standing with - vaguely recognizing Reno and Tseng from after work drinks, along with a few more faces he didn’t recognize at all. 

“This place is great,” she enthused to the assembled group, “I looked it up before driving out - it’s like a retirement home for farm animals. They take guests to help pay for upkeep - and they have _miniature ponies_.” 

Her zeal was, if not contagious, at very least charming. 

“I’ve always considered myself not to have enough half-sized horses in my life,” Reeve agreed solemnly, and she rolled her eyes at him good naturedly. 

Before he could break away to greet the rest of his coworkers the woman handing out pamphlets had turned and started calling and waving up toward the one of the barns, directing the group's attention as she did to where a giant of a man was galloping toward them astride an equally giant black horse. 

The crowd collectively moved back, splitting apart to make space for the horse to run through as it charged forward - but the movement was unnecessary as the huge animal leaned back on its haunches all at once to come to a sliding halt in a cloud of dust. 

The man on its back hooted and removed his sun bleached stetson, waving it a few times in front of his face to clear the dust before dropping it back onto his head.

“Y’all must be the Shinra group,” he welcomed in an accent that was clearly as theatrical as his entrance, “I see y’all’ve already met Jessie, she’s a real doll, an’ gonna take care of you all for your stay - just let her know if you need anything, hear?” 

There was a reason that Reeve needed to tour the crowd as quickly as possible and get back to Midgar, but he was having trouble remembering what that was when faced with the grinning rider - broad and dark skinned with smiling features, dressed in the most stereotypical ranch gear imaginable right down to honest-to-god _chaps_...

Reeve had never known himself to have any particular affinity for cowboys, but in one short moment the man in front of him had him reevaluating _everything_. 

The horse was back on its feet, the big man astride it encouraging it to dance back and forth before the assembled white-collar crowd with small movements of his muscular thighs, and Reeve was realizing he had never stood a chance. He was finished. He was going all in on sexy cowboys. At least one sexy cowboy. 

Something must have showed on his face, because the man was suddenly grinning at him - specifically _at him_ of all the assembled group - and tipping his stetson with a wink before turning the horse around and bolting off again with a click of his tongue and another flex of his powerful legs, leaving Reeve to wonder what the hell just hit him. 

“Reeve? Hey, Reeve, did you get all that?” Elena was elbowing him. He noticed that the rest of the group was moving to collect their packs out of their cars, and realized that instructions had been given while he was busy staring at the man on horseback. 

“Sorry, all of what?” he asked her, and she laughed at him.

“Jessie’s going to take us to our cabins. That guy did a number on you, huh? Seemed to like you, too,” she elbowed his ribs again and he grunted - she was tiny but she packed a punch, and the moment that it took him to recover his breath also let him rally his composure. 

“Too bad I don’t have a cowboy fetish,” Reeve cleared his throat and shrugged, “I’m going to grab my suitcase.” 

His coworkers, he realized, were all laughing about the whole thing - the caricature of a cowboy come to welcome them to a cheesy week’s retreat in the country, and their expectations of the ridiculous stories they would be taking home with them as souvenirs. It made Reeve wonder if they had not all seen the same man that he had just seen, but he banished the thought quickly.

Unlike the most of the crowd, though, Elena and Reno were _definitely_ talking about Reeve specifically by the time he got over to his car and pulled his pack from the trunk, and he was left to hope that someone else would do something embarrassing soon and save him being the top gossip point of the retreat. 

He fell to the back of the crowd as they followed Jessie along a side trail leading down to a large pond and a collection of small cottages. 

\---

Things deteriorated quickly that afternoon when Reeve started the week by falling off a horse. 

“Hey there, city slicker,” Barret - it turned out the sexy cowboy’s name was Barret - grabbed him under the arm with his good hand and dragged him to his feet, in spite of Reeve’s certainty that he had broken every bone he had in the fall. 

“Just leave me for dead,” Reeve protested, the soreness in his shoulder and ribs outweighed only by the sense of crushing humiliation as his coworkers crowded around, watching from their places still comfortably seated on their respective mounts. 

“Awfully sorry about that, man,” Barret continued, voice dropping low as he fell out of character. He brushed the dust enthusiastically from Reeve’s shirt, “You said you knew horses and...” 

Reeve had, in fact, claimed that he 'knew horses' - he was pretty sure he had said all manner of stupid ass things when the group had arrived at the stable and Barret had been there waiting to teach the office workers about tack and riding basics before taking the group out on a tour of the trails. And Reeve had opened his mouth and said the first thing that had come to mind that he thought might impress the _unfairly_ attractive man hovering beside him and showing him the parts of the saddle ( _‘Grew up in the country,’_ \- like his mother’s little home in the suburbs had ever seen a cow). 

“Molly’s got a temper on her,” Barret shook his head, and pushed away the nose of the horse in question when she tried to nibble on his shirt affectionately, “Didn’t think she’d spook like that so close to Cookie, though.” 

“It’s fine,” Reeve assured him in the face of the man’s vaguely worried expression, and thought that it probably was - his pride would recover. Eventually. 

Barret looked him up and down before deciding, “Good. Back up you get, then.” 

“What?” and when he realized that Barret meant for him to get back on the beast, stared at him in disbelief. 

“That’s the rule around here,” Barret announced, sliding back into character as he raised his voice, “Nothing’s broken, you get back in the saddle... C’mon, I’ll give you a boost.” 

Barret did give him a boost back into the saddle (exactly as embarrassing as he expected) when his own momentum left him halfway onto the horse and only the other man grabbing the heel of his boot and pushing him up - lifting him like it was nothing - got him seated back onto his horse. He felt himself flushing at the clapping and laughing of his coworkers and - sexy cowboy or not - wished acutely that he’d emailed out his cat excuse before ever leaving Midgar. 

Barret gave him a look, and some of his misery must have shown because instead of handing him back the reins called to the other two guides on the trail that they’d have to finish the trip themselves, that he was taking Reeve back to the stable. 

The smaller one, Biggs, rolled his eyes while his companion Wedge laughed, “Whatever you say boss!” 

Barret waved them off before vaulting back onto his own mount (the monstrously large black mare turned out to be the _Cookie_ he had mentioned, of all damned names for a horse), without any hesitation or embarrassing ‘boost’. He draped Cookie’s reins over the pommel of her saddle in favour of keeping control over Reeve’s own, more difficult, animal.

Looking over his shoulder Reeve thought that maybe Biggs and Wedge were sharing a look over the whole thing (and Elena was definitely staring after them with a speculative expression), but by then they were already in motion and Reeve grabbed at the saddle for balance, wary of another tumble. 

It was impressive watching Barret control the animals, he had to admit. One handed, no less. Reeve hadn’t noticed the man’s missing hand when he first greeted them in the parking lot - sleeve on his right side tied off just above where his wrist would be - and contemplated whether he should ask about it. 

With his left hand busy leading the obstinate Molly along - less obstinate, with her nose buried uncomfortably close in Cookie’s back end - Barret was left to control the massive animal beneath him with soft words and heels applied gently at the animal’s flanks. Horsemanship, Reeve thought it was called, but had never expected to be impressed by it before being thrown off one of the animals in question. 

As much as it rankled to have made a fool of himself in front of his coworkers for a second time in a single afternoon, Reeve decided that getting to stare at Barret’s broad frame as he led them slowly back toward the stables was an awfully nice consolation. 

\---

Barret led the difficult Molly - gentle as a kitten under Barret’s control - all the way to the stable without incident. 

After dropping from his own mount he circled to help Reeve where he was hesitating over the drop, having learned how it could go badly. Molly, temper renewed after Barret’s big mare had been freed of her bridle and allowed to wander away to graze, made matters worse by dancing beneath him each time he began to inch to one side. 

“Easy does it,” Barret was suddenly beside him, taking control of the horse and placing a reassuring hand against Reeve’s calf as if he needed more gentling than the horse, “Nothin’s gonna happen.” 

Reeve suspected the man was laughing, but under the wide brimmed hat it was impossible to tell.

“Get your feet outta both stirrups and throw your leg over,” Barret instructed him, continuing to narrate as Reeve followed his directions uneasily, “Just like a big bicycle, there you go, city boy.” 

The last part was said as Reeve began to slide out of the saddle, still with a death grip on the pommel, then hung halfway over as the saddle began to slowly tilt to the side after him and the horse turned to give him a disgusted snort. 

“You’ve gotta let go now,” Barret prompted, and Reeve felt the man step closer behind him and move the stabilizing hand higher on his leg. 

Reeve let himself slither the rest of the way down, pressed between the horse in front of him and Barret at his back until his feet were reassuringly planted on the ground, shirt rucked up where Barret’s hand had run the length of him while he was sliding down. 

Safely on the ground, his attention laser focused on the hand resting just below his ribs - calloused, warm palm holding him close and sending all of Reeve’s blood flow immediately southward. 

He coughed lightly and tried to step away, but with a horse in the way made due to turn in place, resulting in Barret’s warm hand sliding to his back as he craned his neck to meet the man’s eyes. 

Reeve raised his hands to make some space between them but instead ended up resting them on Barret’s chest - very firm, very warm even through the shirt - and he was even more sure that Barret was laughing at him, the beginning of a smile tugging at one corner of his mouth and and extra light in his dark eyes. 

He wasn’t _just_ laughing, though. And he wasn’t moving his hand, either.

“Hey,” Reeve greeted him from close range, making a conscious decision to keep his hands in place at least until Barret moved his own.

“Hey yourself,” Barret answered him, tiny smile turning into a grin that showed a bright flash of teeth and told Reeve everything he needed to know about their position. 

Reeve thought he could almost hate Elena for always being right, except...

“You come here often?” Reeve asked, meeting Barret’s smile with a small smirk of his own. 

“Been known to happen, a time or two.” 

“Got a place right around the corner,” Reeve suggested, thinking of the little cabins down by the pond, “The neighbours are a little rowdy but I think they’ve all gone out right now...” 

Barret looked at him speculatively, then sighed and stepped away while shaking his head, “Gotta take care of your horse first, city boy. Untack ‘er and clean ‘er down, then we’ll talk.” 

Reeve turned to look at Molly, who had in turn swung her head around to fix him with an expression that mirrored the way he felt about the prospect. They shared an exasperated sigh. 

\---

When Barret said _‘then we’ll talk,’_ Reeve had not expected him to mean literally. 

They stood shoulder to shoulder alongside the fences where the ranch’s small herd of cows milled and foraged among the brambles, while Barret explained what to expect the next day when the group would ‘drive’ the cattle up into the foothills to spend the week grazing. 

The cows didn’t look particularly like they needed to be driven anywhere, watching the men at the fence with soft eyed and complacency. Occasionally, one would break away from the herd to butt against Barret, snuffling and tugging at him, looking for treats while he patted the massive things like they were housepets. The first few had made Reeve step back from the fence defensively, but the look of amusement he earned each time finally stung his pride hard enough that he stayed put, even when one of the things pushed its giant head against him, too, and its improbably long tongue wrapped experimentally around his wrist. 

He pulled away with a startled noise and looked over to see Barret watching him with ongoing amusement, “Guess you taste good.” 

Reeve was a grown man, and he did not blush. 

He didn’t. 

Any rebuttal he was going to offer was overridden by a louder mooing than the rest, and then the sea of peaceful backs was broken as one of the cows started climbing on top of another.

“Are they fighting?” Reeve asked, backing away from the fence again. 

“Nope, not fighting,” and Barret clearly wasn’t even trying to hide his laughter any more. 

“Can they do that? Right out in the open like this?” and his shock only made Barret laugh harder. 

“Where else they gonna do it? ... but you’re right, he’s not gonna get much of anything done. ‘S Buster - hasn’t figured out he’s a steer yet.” 

“... Does the other cow mind?” 

“Mind...?” Barret asked, looking out at the herd thoughtfully, “Well, maybe. Buddy’s pretty easy going, but he’ll let ‘im know when the fun’s over.” 

The pronouns made Reeve look again, and saw that the cow ‘Buster’ had mounted was also sporting an impressive set of horns. 

“Is that why there are no baby… calves... here?” 

“Ha!” Barret hooted and slapped his thigh, still distractingly clad in the chaps he’d first appeared in, “Naw, Avalanche is as a rescue. They’re all steers, here.”

Reeve didn’t know what a steer was, but from the context assumed it meant ‘confused gay cow’, and didn’t have the nerve to ask. 

“Rescue?” he asked instead.

“Damnit, I told Jessie no one reads the pamphlets,” Barret cursed, then laughed again and pulled himself up to sit on the crossbars of the fence, gesturing for Reeve to do the same (after glancing at the giant animals milling a few short meters away he shook his head in decline, and Barret shrugged), “Used to be a cattle ranch, back when my parents owned it. I went off to school for agricultural science and by the time I got back I didn’t have the stomach for it any more.” 

He glanced over at Reeve as if to gauge his reaction, and Reeve nodded at him to go on.

“Opened it up to tourists, families... corporate groups,” he grinned, “First was just supposed to be a dude ranch - that real old west experience, you know? But the more the small farms get pushed out, the more people are looking for places to send their animals that aren’t the feed lots or the glue factories... business does about as well as it ever did, but this way nobody dies.” 

“That’s noble,” Reeve affirmed when Barret glanced at him, and the man gave a small shrug. 

“One way to think of it.”

It wasn’t long before they were able to spot the rest of the group making their way back along the trails from the foothills, looking tired and happy and generally like they’d had a great time pretending to be cowboys for the afternoon. 

“Guess that’s your cue to get going,” Barret announced, hopping down from the fence with more grace than he should have managed given his size. 

“Guess it is,” Reeve answered, seized with sudden disappointment. He wasn’t sure what he’d been expecting, exactly, back in the stable when Barret had helped him from the horse, but he’d been hoping for more than ringside seats on Buster’s romantic endeavours. 

Barret looked at him thoughtfully for a moment, and Reeve wondered exactly what was showing on his face to make the other man suddenly grin and slap him on the back enthusiastically, “C’mon by the stables tonight if you want. Maybe we can work out some remedial lessons on staying in the saddle.” 

It may have been the single worst pick up line that Reeve had ever heard. And with Barret as the prize, it was damn well working. 

\---

Reeve fell in with the rest of his coworkers as they limped and stumbled back along the track to their lodgings down by the pond. He was nursing his own sore ribs and shoulder from his earlier tumble, but looking at the assembled office crowd figured he’d gotten off light compared to the complaints of bug bites, sore thighs and aching buttocks from the extended trip on horseback. 

He thought again of _remedial lessons_ and snickered to himself, schooling his expression only as Elena sidled up beside him - limping marginally less than the rest of her department, or at least hiding it better - to ask, “So what did the sexy cowboy want after he cut you away from the rest of the herd?” 

Reeve stared at her. Isolated from the herd? Was that what had just happened? 

He thought of the warm hand sliding under his rucked up shirt, and decided that he was very, very okay with that. 

“Took me out to see the cattle,” he answered, skimming over the part in the barn, “explained the itinerary for tomorrow.” 

Elena frowned with obvious disappointment, clearly having been hoping for something juicer, “Well, he certainly kept his eyes on you when you were coming up to meet us. Better watch yourself, Reeve, or he might be riding you next.” 

It was, in fact, rather what he’d been hoping for himself, but wasn’t ready to give her the satisfaction of confirming it. 

\---

In his small cabin by the pond, Reeve let himself indulge in an extended shower after a dubious (but, he had to admit, _fun_ ) meal cooked over open campfires under Wedge’s supervision. He’d forgotten for a while, basking under the attractive ranch owner’s attentions, how much damn dust there was around the place, but there seemed to be no end of it once he set about washing it from his skin and hair, pale brown water circling and circling the drain at his feet as he scrubbed. 

He wondered if it was the kind of thing you got used to, or if you just had to be born into it - like the natural way that Barret controlled the ranch’s massive denizens as if they were kittens. 

He finally emerged, clean and in a fresh set of clothes, to find most of his colleagues crowded around a large central campfire where Wedge was tuning a guitar and Jessie was distributing kits to make s’mores. 

“Reeve, over here,” Elena called to him when he was spotted. She was seated with Reno, and the two waved him over enthusiastically. 

He went close enough to speak without shouting but didn’t sit, “Thought I’d take a walk up the trail, actually... maybe check out the stables again now that it’s quiet.” 

Biggs and Jessie shared a look and rolled their eyes at one another, “Take one of the dogs with you,” Jessie instructed, “You get coyotes at night, sometimes.” 

Reeve found he wasn’t sure whether he was more worried about the coyotes or about the great shaggy thing that appeared at his heels at Biggs’s command, bigger than anything anyone kept in Midgar - a broad headed, barrel chested animal. It was good, quiet company though as he made his way up the pre-dark trail, followed by a whooping from Elena and an obscenely loud wolf whistle from Reno, who clearly shared the opinion that his desire to go for a walk wasn’t without ulterior motive. 

It was a relief, to leave the crowd behind him and walk through the early evening with his shaggy guard. It was more of a relief to emerge from the trees at the other end of the trail and head for the stable where the lights were already shining inside in deference to the approaching twilight. 

He’d begun to doubt, over the afternoon, whether he’d misread Barret’s intentions in asking him up to the stables in the evening. It had seemed clear enough... the terrible line delivered in suggestive tones, the slow smile that accompanied it. Had seemed so clear at the time, but then, so had the moment in front of the stables earlier - and that had deteriorated into staring at a collection of flatulent cows for an hour. 

By the time he stepped into the warm yellow light of the stable, Reeve had just about convinced himself that Barret really was planning to spend an awkward evening showing him saddles. 

While he was still trying to think of how to navigate his way out of that situation, some noise from either him or the dog alerted Barret to their presence, because the man looked up from a workbench and broke into a wide grin. 

“Thought you got lost, city boy,” Barret greeted him, already halfway across the floor by the time Reeve registered he was moving. 

He didn't get a chance to answer back before Barret had grabbed him and pushed him against a stall door. The startled horse behind the door still wasn’t nearly as startled as Reeve himself when Barret kissed him forcefully and thoroughly, pushing doubts - and any other thoughts - from his mind with a hot press of lips and tongue. 

Reeve barely rallied his wits to wrap his arms over the man’s massive shoulders and kiss him back when a knee pushed between his legs and pinned him in place. He felt Barret’s hand slide to the nape of his neck to draw him closer, and he went willingly, already buzzing with surprised arousal. 

“Wanted to do that earlier,” Barret told him when they broke apart for air, panting and watching Reeve closely with eyes that seemed darker than they had in the afternoon sunlight. 

“Why didn’t you?” 

“Was still on the clock,” Barret admitted, and looked vaguely embarrassed by that, if by nothing else in their position. 

“And now?” Reeve asked. He shifted against the leg still pinning him firmly against the stall door, solid and muscular, and felt a fresh throb of arousal. 

“I’m not working for your boss again until 9am tomorrow.” 

“Oh. Oh, good.” 

Reeve rather wished that Barret had said something to that effect sooner rather than letting him wonder all day, but was hardly in a place to be resent it - pinned as he was with a few short inches between him and the other man, lips still sensitized from the kiss and the stirrings of something even more pleasant starting beneath his belt. 

“So,” Barret leaned forward again, this time to rumble his words directly into Reeve’s ear and sending a shiver through him, “Wanna take a ride?” 

“Absolutely,” Reeve agreed, and was dismayed all over again when Barret stepped back and tilted his head to indicate where the back doors of the stables opened out onto wide fields and finally to the foothills of the nearby mountain range. 

His heart sank briefly upon concluding that Barret had meant the riding literally, but when he followed the man out through the back of the stable there were no horses waiting - just Barret and that slow, teasing smile when he reached over to grab Reeve by the hand and start leading him away from the ranch buildings and into the fields. 

Barret didn’t let go of Reeve’s hand once they were moving either, the way that Reeve had expected - instead falling into step beside him and keeping him pinned there with the point of contact between them. It felt strange, walking out into the evening sunset with clasped hands - too intimate for a hookup, although the soft movement of Barret’s thumb across the back of his hand seemed hotwired to whatever part of Reeve’s hindbrain was responsible for deciding it was time for sex.

He was beginning to realize that he was destined to remain off-balance with the frustratingly attractive cowboy. 

The growing impulse to ask exactly where they were going, what the endgame was, was interrupted when Barret started narrating their surroundings to him as they wandered further along the dusty trail through the fields of cut hay. 

It was the first cut of the season, Reeve learned, and the sweetest - dried and rolled into bales at intervals through the field. There would be another cut before the winter came, maybe two if the weather held. Barret told him about the irrigation he wanted to put in to normalize the yield. The new baling machine they’d purchased the year before. Rotating the cattle across the fields year by year to keep the soil healthy. 

Reeve let it wash over him with limited understanding, instead just watching the man beside him, trying to read what his intention was as they got further and further from the main buildings and Barret waved his free arm to indicate the landmarks of the ranch. That, he thought, might have been part of the issue - Barret concerned about Reeve’s acceptance of the damaged limb, testing to see if he would cut and run before things got heavy. 

Just as Reeve was beginning to think that all they were going to do was talk, the bruising kiss in the stable seeming farther and farther behind them, Barret pulled him off the path and into the field, dropping down behind one of the big round hay bales and dragging Reeve down after him. 

The hay gave off a fresh, green fragrance - sweeter than he had imagined, from a distance - and made a sharp contrast to the deeply masculine smell of Barret when the man wrapped an arm around the small of his back to pull him in close.

“You were starting to look a little saddle sore, there, city slicker,” the silly lines were back, with the over-blown persona that seemed to come and go at Barret’s convenience, “Thought maybe you were overdue for a rub down.” 

“I...” Reeve hesitated. The lines were silly, but the brazenly obvious intention behind them wasn’t. 

He was no sooner seated than Barret’s hand moved from the base of his spine to wrap around the nape of his neck and pull him in for another bruising kiss - skipping all formalities and going directly to hot and wanting, full of teeth and tongue. 

On solid ground with that, Reeve slipped free from the hand at his nape and lifted himself to straddle the man’s lap, pressing Barret back against the hay with hands that started by holding his face through more kisses but soon made their way down to rest on the solid muscle of his chest. 

When he felt Barret begin to shift and twitch beneath him Reeve broke away from the kisses to mouth his way along the man’s jaw, starting to move down the thickly muscled column of his neck when the Barret’s hand ran from up where it was resting just above his belt to tangle in his hair - tilting his head back to give access for Barret to place an open kiss over his adam’s apple before moving down to lick into the hollow of his throat in a way that shot unexpected fire low into Reeve’s belly, hot breath following kisses and licks across his clavicle and making him shake. 

“Get undressed,” Barret whispered after a time, pulling back and releasing his grip at the back of Reeve’s neck. 

“Out here?” Reeve tried to focus through the building fog of arousal, “What if someone sees us?” 

“Think Buster ever cared?”

“Yes, but...” he glanced around the fields, rolling away in every direction and offering little shelter. _But we aren’t confused cows,_ he wanted to say, but figured it wasn’t the most lucid argument. 

“No one’s gonna see us out here,” Barret gripped his thigh and pulled him forward to make them grind together meaningfully, “ _If_ anyone else is out here, it’s for the same reason... they’re not gonna see us, and we’re not gonna see them. You understand?” 

Reeve did. 

He pushed himself to his feet, hunched from the pressure in his jeans, and stripped quickly - first the shirt then, after a quick look around to confirm that there really wasn’t anyone else around to see them, kicked off his boots to strip his jeans and underwear in one go. 

Barret was watching him with eyes gone dark and heavy lidded, with a slow smile that tugged at the corner of his mouth. 

“Not bad, city boy. C’mere.” 

Reeve _‘c’mere’_ ed, sliding back into Barret’s lap to kiss him again - hotter this time and a little more desperate before breaking away. 

“Can’t help noticing, I’m the only one undressed here” Reeve observed, panting, and rolled his hips down against Barret’s denim-clad erection until the man hissed, “Hardly seems fair.” 

“Guess you’re right,” Barret conceded. He reached up to grab his hat and dropped it onto Reeve’s head, “Better?”

The heavy stetson, ridiculously oversized on Reeve, dropped low on his forehead where it was only held up by his ears. The gesture managed to be charming all the same. Everything Barret did seemed to be charming, and Reeve was beginning to wonder if he really did in fact have some hitherto undiscovered cowboy fetish.

The brim of the hat shaded his eyes from the glare of sunset, and let him take a good look at the other man’s features, cast as they were in flaming oranges and near-dark shadows. Barret stared back at him, gentle faced and watchful in spite of how frantic he must have felt (how frantic Reeve was feeling, with his erection pressed snuggly against the rough work shirt covering Barret’s stomach).

He reached up to cup Barret’s face and ran his thumb across the man’s brow, making his eyes drop closed. Reeve let his fingers curl around the space behind the shell of Barret’s ear, traced the delicate skin just below the start of his tight braids. Moved the hand down to give the gentlest tug on the piercing in his lobe and making him suck a breath. 

Barret reached up to cover Reeve’s hand with his own, turning his head to nip gently at the heel of his palm and making Reeve shiver and grind against him in reply, felt himself growing harder against the rough fabric of Barret’s heavy shirt and the solid muscle beneath. 

He reached hands between them to begin undoing Barret’s shirt, exposing his muscular chest a few inches at a time, lingering over each button to let his knuckles brush and tease across the skin beneath and making Barret huff out a surprised breath.

“Now where’d you learn a thing like that,” Barret asked, and covered Reeve’s hands with his, stilling them as he arched forward to press lips to the side of Reeve’s neck. He pushed Reeve back to rest against his bent knees, solid under the heavy chaps he still wore, while Barret’s hand and eyes explored his exposed form. 

Reeve felt his cock jumping to attention as Barret’s massive hand ran across his chest, brushed through the coarse hair there and gave a light squeeze to the muscle of his pectoral before thumb and forefinger closed over his nipple and sent a jolt of electricity directly to his erection. 

“Ahh, Barret, that’s good,” he praised, and his enjoyment clearly wasn’t subtle because the man beneath him grinned wolfishly before letting the hand slide lower down his torso, fingers teasing at the thicker line of hair that ran down past his navel and making his cock strain for attention. 

“Can I?” Barret asked with his hand hovering critical, frustrating inches from the goal. 

Reeve grit his teeth, “ _Please._ ”

Barret laughed, low and rumbling, before enveloping Reeve in his hot hand, stroking him slowly a few times as his thumb drew circles against the head and sent a series of little shocks of pleasure through him. Reeve braced himself with his hands against Barret’s knees as his back arched into the touch and he groaned out his approval. 

“What do you want?” Barret asked him, stilling his hand. He fixed Reeve with a thoughtful look, and Reeve focused his mind to consider - distracted by the hand on his cock that continued to hold him, hot and tight. 

He rocked into Barret’s hold a few times experimentally. Pressed down against the other man’s obvious arousal, constrained as it still was inside the unyielding fabric of his jeans. It must have been uncomfortable, but Barret hadn’t complained yet. 

“Want you to fuck me” he decided, rolling his hips against the hardness beneath him and enjoying the way that Barret hissed, showed some crack in his control. 

“Think you can stay in the saddle for that?” Barret teased him, and Reeve found himself glaring in return. 

“If you don’t want to-” 

“No, didn’t say that!” Barret let go of Reeve’s cock to grab his hip, holding him in place while grinding up against him, dulled by the rough denim but obviously achingly hard, “Just shift off a minute so I can...” 

Reeve slid to the side and resumed undoing Barret’s shirt even as the man tugged open his belt and undid his pants, wiggling them down his hips to get himself free with a heaving sigh of relief. 

Reeve turned from where he had closed his mouth over one of Barret’s newly exposed nipples to assess what the man was packing and discovered an erection as imposing as the rest of him, arching up toward his naval. 

“Still okay?” Barret asked, and Reeve realized he had frozen staring. 

He gave himself a little shake, “Real good,” he confirmed. 

“Good” Barret pulled himself back to sit straighter against the bale behind him and wrapped his hand around the small of Reeve’s back again to direct him, “C’mon on top of me.”

When Reeve moved to straddle him though Barret shook his head and stopped him, “Other way.” 

“Uh.” 

“Go on,” Barret encouraged him, and Reeve let himself be maneuvered to sit astride Barret with his hands braced against the man’s pulled up knees. He looked over his shoulder but Barret shook his head again, pointed out across the fields to where the sun was sinking languidly behind the distant mountains, “When’s the last time you had sex under the sky, city boy?” 

Reeve wasn’t sure he ever had, and the attention drawn back to it left him again feeling exposed and adrift. Not enough to call a halt to the proceedings, though. 

“Usually prefer a bed,” he said, but pushed himself back against the man beneath him until he felt Barret’s erection pressed hard against his ass, felt small trembles in the man’s legs beneath his hands that let him know the effort of self control Barret was making. 

“You sure? Maybe it’s just the position you don’t like,” Barret speculated with a note of teasing, and suddenly his voice was close in Reeve’s ear, hot breath and hot whispers as his chest pressed the full length of Reeve’s back, “Maybe instead I should press you down and take you like a beast, out in the field.” 

The image was evocative. Reeve imagined himself pressed face down into the cut hay and long grass while Barret pushed into him from behind, and felt a shudder roll through that finished with a heavy throb in his cock, “Maybe tomorrow night.” 

“Maybe tomorrow.. Ha!” Barret let out a single bark of a laugh and punctuated it with a light slap across Reeve’s exposed ass, making him jump then squirm back, “I like the way you think, city slicker. Think you’ll still be up for it after a hard ride tonight?” 

“You did tell me how important it is to get back in the saddle,” Reeve countered, twisting again to watch Barret over his shoulder. 

“Guess I did. Well then...” he grabbed Reeve’s shoulder and pulled him back until he was laying against Barret’s chest, the incredible heat of the man unaffected by the cooling evening air, cock hot at hard against the base of his Reeve’s spine, “ready to saddle up?” 

“Please,” Reeve agreed, and Barret hummed and began to mouth absently along the line where Reeve’s neck met his shoulder, wiggling as he clearly tried to retrieve something from the pouch on his belt. 

Reeve pushed himself back impatiently against Barret’s cock, making the other man hiss before instructing him, “work yourself a bit and stay ready for me.” 

Reeve did as instructed, wrapping a hand around himself and rocking forward into it, back against Barret, until the man grunted and pushed him forward with a huff of a sigh. 

“Here,” Barret said, and before Reeve could ask for clarification there was a sound of a lid clicking open and Barret’s arm reached around him to tip a bottle of lube over Reeve’s hand, slicking him up as he worked himself and making him groan as his fist turned slippery. 

“Prepared for this, huh?” 

“Prepared is part of the job... ready?” 

“Yeah.” 

Slick fingers settled against his ass and a digit pressed against his hole, rubbing back and forth against the sensitive muscle there before pressing in. 

“God,” Reeve grit his teeth and squeezed himself in time with the stretch of his ass, resulting in a shiver of arousal low in his belly. 

“Alright?” Barret asked and Reeve nodded furiously. Any doubt that Barret knew exactly what he was doing evaporated when he pressed in further, twisting until he found the spot that made Reeve see stars and need to steady himself against Barret’s bent knee with his free hand. 

A second finger joined the first, stretching tighter and turning into a sweet ache, set him breathing heavily while he concentrated on relaxing into it, pressing back against the man behind him. 

“That okay?” Barret asked once Reeve was again rocking into him. 

“Don’t make me wait,” Reeve growled back, and was answered by the low rumble of Barret’s laugh. 

“Not gonna make you wait for anything, baby, gonna have to help me though.” 

Reeve looked back over his shoulder as Barret’s hand slid free of him, and he watched the man grabbing up a condom packet and tearing it open with his teeth before rolling it onto himself expertly. 

“Doesn’t look like you need any help,” Reeve observed.

Barret grinned wolfishly in reply, “Just... raise yourself up a bit and help me line up so I don’t hurt you.” 

“Not gonna break,” Reeve protested, but did as he was asked. There might have been some bravado to the claim - Barret was big, and it had been a while - but he grabbed Barret’s cock to press himself down onto it, feeling the stretch and burn as his body tried to accommodate the intrusion. 

“Take it slow,” Barret coaxed him when he hissed through his teeth, hand coming to rest against Reeve’s thigh and his thumb drawing small, reassuring circled there, “There ya go. Easy does it.” 

Reeve felt a fleeting urge to snicker when it sounded almost as if Barret was trying to calm one of the horses, but it was… pleasant. The low tones and gentle touch, gentle praise, had him throbbing and wanting even as he panted with the effort of accommodating Barret. Pushed himself down until he was seated snugly to the other man, and Barret was groaning under him.

“Damn, Reeve, never expected, ahh, did so good,” Barret’s hand was around his waist, pulling him back until they were pressed flush together again, and Reeve let his head fall back onto Barret’s solid shoulder as the motion made the man shift inside him. 

“Can’t believe you took it all at once like that,” Barret murmured against his ear, before dropping his head to mouth at the side of Reeve’s neck where his muscles had bunched from the effort, “Damn, that was so hot. Feel so good inside.” 

Reeve groaned as Barret shifted his hips again under him and drew extra attention to the burn of his stretched ass. His own erection had flagged in the effort to take Barret, but revived soon enough when Barret reached around him to take hold of him, calloused hand touching him in long strokes that he felt through his whole body and soon enough had him squirming and pressing back impatient against Barret’s cock, feeling Barret throb inside him in turn. 

“Ready?” Barret asked him, between placing slow, sucking kisses across his exposed neck and shoulder. 

“When you are, Cowboy” Reeve answered, and felt the vibration of Barret’s laughter all through him, tying right into the arousal coiled low in his belly and making him push himself more enthusiastically between Barret’s hand and his cock. 

Barret hummed against his skin then told him “Grab my knees, and keep your eyes on the horizon.” 

“I... what?” 

Barret hummed again, “Want you to look at where you are, and know you’re right here, with me... right now, you’re mine.” 

Reeve groaned in response and let himself be pressed forward against Barret’s powerful legs, watching as he did the slow sunset behind the mountains that painted the wide plains in streaks of orange and twilight. 

When Barret began to fuck him in earnest it wasn’t gentle like what had come before, was raw and intense and made him cling hard against the man beneath him even while the coiled energy inside him began building toward a peak. 

Barret spilled out soft curses and encouragements as he thrust up into Reeve, clearly also building fast toward climax as he stroked Reeve’s erection in time with his thrusts. 

Reeve heard more than felt himself groaning, shifting on his knees in the cut grass to chase the angle that made lights flash behind his eyes, left him helplessly leaking precome across Barret’s knuckles.

“Ahh, Barret, not gonna last,” he panted out, and knew it was true, felt his balls pulling tight and the coil of arousal pulling tighter in his gut. 

“Good. Want you to come for me,” Barret growled, breathing fast and harsh against the nape of Reeve’s neck before biting down onto his shoulder while slamming harder into him. 

Reeve let out a groan that turned into a shout as the his arousal peaked and then came apart, left him spasming and thrusting hard into Barret’s hand and shooting out across the field before them, seizing and releasing almost painfully tight over the weight of Barret’s erection inside him. 

“Goddamn,” Barret groaned, stroking him through until Reeve whimpered and pushed the hand away from his over-sensitized cock. Barret took the opportunity to clamp his hand over Reeve’s hip with bruising strength, thrusting up into him with renewed vigor until he, too, was groaning, Pulling Reeve down onto him until he was buried as deep as he could go and making tiny, abortive thrusts in time with a pulsing orgasm. 

“Maybe you do know how to stay in the saddle,” Barret announced when his breathing had returned almost to normal, and laughed at his own joke when Reeve glared at him over his shoulder, but felt too mellow to bother with a comeback. 

“Can you get up?” Barret asked when he didn’t reply. 

Reeve could - Barret slipping free of him uncomfortably as he lifted himself onto rubbery legs and stepped away, ass throbbing with the sweet soreness of being well fucked. He reached to help Barret tie off the condom and set it aside, then started to pull his clothes back into place slowly as the other man did the same.

“Oh, your hat,” amazed the thing had stayed on at all, Reeve pulled it off and handed it across to Barret who accepted it with a grin. 

“Didn’t look half bad in it,” Barret told him, and Reeve grinned as he dropped back into the grass next to the man. He winced at a distant twinge from his abused ass, not yet past the rush of endorphins but knowing that he’d be exactly as ‘saddle sore’ as Barret had threatened come morning. 

Without thinking too much about it he settled against Barret’s right side, and felt a moment of tension before the man sighed and shrugged his arm around Reeve’s shoulder anyway. 

Reeve decided it felt good (not just because he’d gotten laid, although that was damn great), pulled against the hard muscle of Barret’s chest for more long, slow kisses as the sun went down. Less sex-charged than affectionate in a way that Reeve didn’t usually expect from a hookup - but seemed perfectly in place where they sat under the darkening sky, in the lingering smell of sex and sweat and sweet cut grass. 

Sat until the stars were out and the nighttime chill forced them back toward the lights of the ranch.


End file.
